Motivating students to doing something is a big challenge. Motivating them to accomplish something with purpose and a specific goal in mind is also a challenge. With this in mind, I have come up with a Monster Box. The monster box is a way for students to be motivated to accomplish a task with a specific goal in mind that rewards their efforts in a tangible way. Much like my Incentive Cards, this accomplishes the same goal, but in a different way.
I made my monster box by simply cutting the top off of a Goldfish box. Then I glued pieces of construction paper around the box.
I got the monsters from an bulletin board set. Here is some you could print out from Scappin Doodles for $1.00!
You could put anything on the side of the box, as long as you can cut a whole at the mouth.
I bought inexpensive pom poms to feed the monster with. My kids loved it! I made each monster a different focus. So we had the note monster, the rhythm monster, the dynamic monster and the posture monster. You could come up with whatever focus you wanted to.
Incentive cards are a great motivation tool for any activity. Students love the fun backgrounds and try to fill up their cards with the tokens. I printed these out front and back on card stock and then laminated them. I use magnetic chips to fill the circles, but you can use bingo chips, pennies, M&M's, etc.. You can use the incentive card to motivate a student to practice. They must complete a passage with no errors, or with dynamics, or 5 times to get a chip. You can add a fun element and roll a dice to see how many chips you are playing for. Have fun with the incentive cards. Let me know if you have a request for a favorite character and I will try and make one.
Incentive cards are a great motivation tool for any activity. Students love the fun backgrounds and try to fill up their cards with the tokens. I printed these out front and back on card stock and then laminated them.
I use magnetic chips to fill the circles, but you can use bingo chips, pennies, M&M's, etc..
You can use the incentive card to motivate a student to practice. They must complete a passage with no errors, or with dynamics, or 5 times to get a chip.
You can add a fun element and roll a dice to see how many chips you are playing for. Have fun with the incentive cards.
Let me know if you have a request for a favorite character and I will try and make one.
This is a really fun game where students can work on their musical alphabet, intervals and chords.
Changing Cups Challenge is inspired from an idea on Pinterest.
You need some foam coffee cups and sharpe pens. Take 3 cups and stack them together. Then write the alphabet around the edge of one of the cups, spacing the letters out evenly. Write the alphabet on the other two cups so that they line up evenly with the first cup. The letters should line up and you can spell different chords with by rotating the cups.
Now you can need to make a cup with a flat alphabet and a sharp alphabet, so you can have all the major and minor chords
Other possibilities are making intervals. Can you name the interval displayed?
Another idea is to build inversions.
For beginner students you can have them stack the cups in alphabetical order. What comes before the first cup? What comes after the last cup? Can you play that note? Can you play all the notes on the cup?
UPDATE
I also discovered students like stacking the cups, so I created a set to stack. See the pictures below of a student stacking a skipping alphabet.
This is a really fun game where students can work on their musical alphabet, intervals and chords.
Changing Cups Challenge is inspired from an idea on Pinterest.
You need some foam coffee cups and sharpe pens. Take 3 cups and stack them together. Then write the alphabet around the edge of one of the cups, spacing the letters out evenly. Write the alphabet on the other two cups so that they line up evenly with the first cup. The letters should line up and you can spell different chords with by rotating the cups.
Now you can need to make a cup with a flat alphabet and a sharp alphabet, so you can have all the major and minor chords
Other possibilities are making intervals. Can you name the interval displayed?
Another idea is to build inversions.
For beginner students you can have them stack the cups in alphabetical order. What comes before the first cup? What comes after the last cup? Can you play that note? Can you play all the notes on the cup?
I have a wonderful new resource to chase away the winter blues:
Winter Wonderland Music Games
Join Presto Penguin and Silly Snowman as they play games and have fun.
Level 1 includes: Icy Igloos: Help Presto Penguin find his igloo by matching his note to the correct note name Notes reviewed are C position and Middle C position Hat Trick Level 1 and 2: Match the hat to the correct time signature on the snowman Silly Snowman Steps: Silly Snowman needs help completing his steps with the musical alphabet Rhythms include quarter note, quarter rest, half note, whole note, dotted half note, half rest and whole rest. Silly Snowman Skips: Silly Snowman needs help completing his skips with the musical alphabet Race to the Igloo: Identify music symbols correctly and be the first one to the igloo Fishing for Notes on the Keyboard: Help catch the fish as you identify notes on the keyboard Fishing for Notes on the Staff: Help catch the fish as you identify notes on the staff
Last Snowman Standing: Identify steps, skips and repeated notes and be the last snowman standing
Level 2 includes:
Icy Igloos: Help Presto Penguin find his igloo by matching his note to the correct note name
Notes reviewed are Low C to High C
Hat Trick Level 3 and 4: Match the hat to the correct time signature on the snowman
Rhythms focus on eighth notes, dotted quarter note, eighth rest, 6/8 time and 3/8 time
Build a Snowman Major Chords: Help match major chords to the correct snowman
Build a Snowman Minor Chords: Help match minor chords to the correct snowman
Race to the Igloo: Identify music symbols correctly and be the first one to the igloo
Snowflake Circle of 5th: Complete the circle of 5th on the snowflake
Last Snowman Standing: Identify intervals to see who is the last snowman standing
There is an instruction guide included with fun ideas and creative ways to play in each level.
To purchase a product simply click on the paypal button below and I will email you the zip file.
Winter Wonderland Music Games Level 1
Includes: Games, printables and instructions
Format: PDF
Printing: 8.5' x 11' - Grayscale or Color
Price: $8.99
Pay with Paypal
I am officially obsessed with Pinterest. Pinterest is like a virtual bulletin board. If you see something you like on any site you can "pin it" to one of your boards. You can comment on the new "pin" with things you want to remember about it. Say it is a recipe, you can comment "Want to try this for dinner next week" or "Would go great with potatoes." You can organize your boards into different categories, so all your recipe pins would go on one board and all your music ideas would go on another.
Then the fun begins to happen. People can see your boards and will pin things you have found. You can visit their boards and repin things to your board. It is a great way to find ideas other people have liked or used. You can follow me on Pinterest by following this link:
Enter the giveaway by: 1. Commenting below (1 entry) 2. Linking the post on your website or blog. Make sure you leave a comment telling me about your link. (3 bonus entries) 3. Posting about it on Facebook. You must first like the Sing a Song page and then tag Sing a Song in your post. (3 bonus entries) You can also comment on the Sing a New Song Music Page. The drawing will be held on November 23rd with http://www.random.org/. I will post the winner on my blog and contact you through email. Good luck!
If you already purchased the product, leave a comment on how you are enjoying it and I will enter your name for the giveaway. For purchasing the product and leaving a review, you will earn an extra 5 entries! If you win, I will refund your money.
I have a new resource available for Christmas called Gingerbread Music Games. There are 7 different games with multiple levels of play. Included is:
Gingerbread Cookie Chords: A fun activity to promote major and minor chords. A step/skip version included for elementary level students. Draw a Gingerbread Man: Students use Rhythm Problems to draw a gingerbread man. 5 levels of rhythm cards included. Catch the Gingerbread Man: A version of Old Maid with a gingerbread twist. Match the Gingerbread Boy and Girl: Match the girl and boy. Levels include keyboard recognition, staff notes and key signatures. Home Sweet Home: Students identify and perform rhythms to get the gingerbread boy to the correct gingerbread house. 5 different levels included. Find the Gingerbread Man: Students try to spy the gingerbread boy who is play hide and seek among musical symbols. 54 cards included. Gingerbread Alphabet: A cute gingerbread alphabet with three suggested activities. Accidentals included.
Includes: Games, printables and instructions
Format: PDF
Printing: 8.5' x 11'
Price: Price: $15.00
Instructions on using it with Paypal: Click on the Buy Now button. You will be asked to pay with Paypal. Once your transaction is accepted, a zip file with the games will be sent to you.
I had a request from a reader to repost the directions for Jenga!
It is a really fun game that the kids love to play. I got the idea from a post on thePiano Club page. I bought a Jenga off brand game ($4.99) and decided to go with the colored blocks. My Jenga game has yellow, blue and red blocks. I took a sharpie and used all the yellow blocks for rhythms. I wrote an easy rhythm on one side and a more challenging rhythm on the other side. the red blocks were use for notes on one side and chords on the other. The blue blocks were used for symbols. The blue blocks made it hard to see the symbol, but not impossible. Another idea for levels is to buy the plain wooden blocks and use different colored sharpies for each level. This could still work for multi level play. For example, if the player who is at level one picks a level three than the closet player to them that is level three must complete the task. The directions are below.
Here is a collection of some online music games sorted into levels based on the Faber and Faber Piano Adventures Series. If you have any sites I have missed, please leave a comment.
